Will Tuesday's Washington primary clip the Democrats' left wing?

Updated 10:04 pm, Saturday, August 4, 2012

Darcy Burner votes in previous U.S. House race, and poses for picture by Joan McCarter of liberal dailykos.com web site. McCarther and dailykos.com are boosting Burner again in 2012.

Darcy Burner votes in previous U.S. House race, and poses for picture by Joan McCarter of liberal dailykos.com web site. McCarther and dailykos.com are boosting Burner again in 2012.

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Suzan DelBene once had the job of trying to increase the market share of Microsoft software in mobile phones. She is now running as Democrat in pitched 1st District U.S. House battle.

Suzan DelBene once had the job of trying to increase the market share of Microsoft software in mobile phones. She is now running as Democrat in pitched 1st District U.S. House battle.

Photo: Jim Bryant, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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State Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe (second from left) celebrates passage of same-sex marriage earlier this year. She is now fighting to hold her State Senate seat against two challengers who champion education reform.

State Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe (second from left) celebrates passage of same-sex marriage earlier this year. She is now fighting to hold her State Senate seat against two challengers who champion education

While uncompromising Tea Party conservatives are the rage of 2012 Republican primaries across America -- witness the Senate contests in Indiana and Texas -- the Washington primary on Tuesday may deliver defeats to its ideological counterpoint, the Democratic left.

Several primary contests, one for the U.S. House of Representatives and the rest for the Legislature, will tell us something about Seattle and Western Washington politics.

And several races are witnessing a curious reversal of hopes.

Reformist Democrats used to hope for a high level of voter interest, and a big turnout, to wash away entrenched regulars. Now, especially in the 1st District race for Congress, entrenched activists on the left are rooting for a low turnout so ideologically committed voters will carry the day.

-- 1st District, U.S. House: Three-time U.S. House candidate Darcy Burner twice called President Obama a "Republican" in tweets, claims to represent "the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party," and delivered a fiery stand-up-for-abortion speech at the national Netroots Nation conference last June in Providence, R.I.

Burner started far ahead in a field of five Democrats in the 1st U.S. House district primary. She is backed by MoveOn.org. The Berkeley, Calif., based dailykos.com web site ceaselessly promotes her. They even made it sound proprietary in a recent headline: "Voting in Darcy Burner's primary starts today."

Joel Connelly has been a staff columnist for more than 30 years. He comments regularly on politics and public policy.

But Northwest Washington is not Occupy Wall Street. Burner has a left-liberal following, but there are other subspecies of the Democratic donkey. State Sen. Steve Hobbs, D-Lake Stevens, is a self-described raging moderate. Ex-State Rep. Laura Ruderman, in office, was an advocate on social issues but a voice for fiscal restraint.

Suzan DelBene, recently state revenue head and once a Microsoft vice president, has cobbled together a broad range of support. She's backed by Gov. Chris Gregoire, U.S. Reps. Rick Larsen and Adam Smith, the Boeing Machinists and Teamsters and the Sierra Club.

DelBene has used her own money to mount a seven-figure advertising campaign, which has drawn a strident, untrue last minute "hit" mailing from Burner -- who had promised never to go negative.

-- 36th District, state House: The retirement of State Rep. Mary Lou Dickerson set off a stampede of Democrats. Two are of the left: Noel Frame has headed the Progressive Majority and was a founding board member of Washington Bus. Sahar Fathi, an aide to Seattle City Councilman Mike O'Brien, talks passionately of representing "women of color" in Olympia.

Still, two non-movement, district-rooted Democrats may make it out of the primary. Seattle Port Commissioner Gael Tarleton has been the linchpin of needed reform at the Port. Brett Phillips, sustainability director at Unico Properties, has copped key union endorsements plus those of three key environmental groups.

A big weekend canvassing drive for Frame, spearheaded by FUSE and the Service Employees International Union -- which once tried to topple moderate State Rep. Helen Sommers here -- could put her in the general election.

-- 11th District, state House: Another open House seat has drawn four Democrats, including Port Commissioner Rob Holland and King County Civil Rights Commissioner Bobby Virk. The focus lately, however, is on non-profit executive, ex-Port of Tacoma executive and education reform advocate Stephanie Bowman.

Online media voices on the left, Slog at The Stranger and Publicola, have in recent days reported with alarm "independent" expenditures on Bowman's behalf by such education reform groups as Stand for Children. Bowman is even getting support -- gasp -- from a business group.

If Bowman makes it out of the primary, the 11th District could feature a showdown between the education establishment (Washington Education Association) and those promoting greater teacher accountability and charter schools.

-- 1st District, state Senate: State Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe has shaped and steered education legislation in Olympia so as to keep it acceptable to the Washington Education Association, which is a bulwark of her support.

She faces a dual challenge in the South Snohomish-North King County district. Democrat Guy Palumbo was initially told by his district chairman that no supporter of charter schools was welcome in the party. Would that apply to President Obama? In Dawn McCravey, Republicans have one of their top Senate challengers of 2012.

As the Washington State Wire reported earlier this week, the 1st District race for the next three months will be a faceoff on the shape of public education in Washington.

-- 46th District, House: The death last fall of State Sen. Scott White produced close-quarters combat in a district that stretches from northeast Seattle into its suburbs at the north end of Lake Washington.

Rep. David Frockt went to the state Senate, where he has been an exemplary newcomer. Longtime 46th District Democrat Gerry Pollet won appointment to the House by beating out White aide Sylvester Cann for support of the district's big, contentious Democratic organization.

Cann is now challenging appointed Rep. Pollet. There is history here. Pollet and White fought a nasty, all-Democratic race for the Legislature in 2008, a contest that featured frequent and rather personal attacks by Pollet.

Once again, schools are the fulcrum. Cann is a supporter of charter schools and has gained backing from such groups as the League of Education Voters. Pollet is a to-the-core Seattle liberal with roots in WASHPIRG (Washington Public Interest Research Group) and Heart of America Northwest, which agitated for cleanup of Hanford.

A curious aspect of several legislative races: On workplace and public education issues, the "establishment" is represented by the Democratic left, its front groups and websites. It can be resistant to proposed reforms keyed to accountability. It is allied with influential unions. It demonizes those in the party who stray from the party line.

The primary election is being held this year in a "high summer" season when Washington voters often tune out politics.

With mail-in ballots, however, Secretary of State Sam Reed has been forecasting a turnout on the order of 45 percent. Will this include a sampling of reform voters and raging moderates?

Columnist Joel Connelly has written about politics for the P-I since 1973.